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“But you’re doing this on his behalf, right?What’s the link?Do you go to the same church?Are you related?”
The figure made that strange, humorless laugh again.Then it turned to face him.There was a horrible black nothingness where the face ought to be.A mask beneath a hood?Whitman realized at that moment that the carpet around him was drenched, seemingly with diesel.He would have been more terrified by this, but at the very same moment, the figure rummaged within the folds of its cloak and brought out a vicious-looking, curved knife.
“Okay, look, do you want money?”Whitman shouted, becoming more frantic at the sight of the blade.“I’ve got money.You can take my cards, I’ll tell you the number.Just tell me what you want!I’ll tell you.” His voice gave out, finally.“Please,” he croaked.
The silence continued, and then, without moving, the shape at the desk said, “I want you to have faith, Professor.”
“F-faith?”
“I want you to understand it.Just once.”
“Well, I don’t have a lot of it right now!”spat Whitman.“What are you doing here?Who are you?”
“To live is to hope.I don’t know who said that, but don’t you think it’s rather beautiful?”
“No, I don’t.I think it belongs on the back of a cereal box!”
“Ah, come on, Professor.Give it its due.The prisoner walking towards the noose.The soldier going over the trenches.”The man spoke with kindness, or something like it.“The skydiver making their jump.The cornered beast, fighting back with its last breath.They all have hope.The hope that they will continue to live.However infinitesimally small that chance might be, they cling onto it, until life is extinguished.Don’t you agree?”
“I- I… okay, yes, but they’re responding to an evolutionary impulse which tells them to-”
“No, Professor, I didn’t ask for a Whitman Memorial Lecture,” the figure interrupted, sharply.“I asked if you agreed.”To underscore the point, the figure stabbed the knife into the leather-topped desk.“For human beings at least, whether we’re talking about plague decimating their village or a war grinding their nation into dust, that hope clashes with another essential aspect of living.Which is… come on, class!”
“The certainty of death,” replied Whitman, sullenly.“Whoopee, you’ve read Bishop Arundel.”
“Youarea childish man, aren’t you?Perhaps that’s why you’ve elected to spend the rest of your life at school.”
“Fuck off.”
“Is that what this whole anti-religion stance is, really, Professor?Getting back at the monks?Those Jesuits had a hands-on approach to education, didn’t they?”
“Look, if you want a debate with me, take these cuffs off and we can talk.I won’t do anything.I won’t report you, I won’t call for help.We can just talk.”
That was the wrong thing to say.The figure flew across the room like a horde of ghosts, coming to kneel right by Whitman, his knife piercing the skin under his chin.
“Say one more word and I’ll slit it open and watch you bleed out like a pig!”he hissed.“Try it and see what happens, Professor!”
Whitman’s wide and terrified eyes signaled surrender.The figure went back to the desk, retrieving a plastic jerry-can.He uncapped it and doused Whitman with it, while making a cross shape and murmuring a prayer.A parody-blessing.That finished, he knelt close to Whitman and hissed in his ear.
“Faith permits us to bridge the gap between life and death!It reconciles us to meaningless lives and pointless deaths alike!Of all the gifts He has bestowed upon His creation, faith is the greatest treasure of all, because it equips us to live in the certainty of not-living.And you…” He took a deep breath, as if controlling a deep inner rage, “you would take that from us, Professor.Ridicule it.Seek to disprove the content of the belief instead of humbly seeking to understand what the beliefdoes.Professor Whitman, since you are obsessed with scientific truth, we are going to conduct an experiment.”
Whitman could only stare in terror now.
“Do you know that some thirty-six people who jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge lived to tell the tale?And that they all had two thoughts as the water rushed up at them.The same two thoughts,allof them.What were those two thoughts, Professor Whitman?No, I don’t want to hear what you think they thought.The thoughts were this: ‘I wish I hadn’t done this’ and ‘I hope there’s a heaven.’The same two thoughts.Everyone: Jewish, Muslim, Catholic, Hindu, atheist…”
The figure rose and an awful truth began to crystallize, ice-cold, up and down Whitman’s spine.
“You, Professor, are going to know faith.”The figure started backing away.“For a second before your flesh is claimed and your cleansed soul rises to the Almighty, you are going to know that it was all true, and that you devoted your life to a lie.”
“Help!”Whitman’s shouts came out hoarse and weak.“Help!”
“Goodbye, Professor,” said the figure, who was right by the door.He opened it, flicked his lighter and held the flame to the carpet before retreating backwards, like a humble servant, bowing, and then closing the door behind him.
What began as a slender tongue of flame turned into a low wall of heat and smoke as it engulfed the desk.Whitman stared at it, transfixed, at the range of hues, from dirty orange to a weird, chemical mauve.It was almost beautiful.With cracked lips, he prayed for a swift death.
But as the bookshelves cracked, the rug hissed, and Whitman’s pain mounted, God clearly wasn’t listening.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
